Tamsin and Ingrid and I stared at the whiteboard in my apartment. At the diagram of my ruin.
There was a reason Laney Keating had taken me under her wing. She’d sensed it in me: that festering resentment, an eager willingness to believe the worst about men. To punish them. Our misandry fueled each other. I know how it makes you feel, she’d said. It’s the same for me. Catharsis. As long as I’d been her consenting cat’s-paw, she’d tolerated the fact that I was one of them, too.
Until now.
Until I pushed too far, showed myself too aware of her motives.
When I told her I’d seen Adam in town, tried to guilt-trip her to get what I wanted, to satisfy my own agenda—then she decided I’d grown too bold.
Laney was no different from Norah. Both girls who’d accuse a man of the worst crime. Foment loathing and indignation against him. Because who wouldn’t believe a guy would do the worst thing? Of course he would. Rape culture, patriarchy, misogyny: these words had leaped from academic discourse into the common vernacular. Norah’s accusation needed no proof. Just her tears, and the whole history of men hurting women behind it.
“You’re not seeing this clearly,” Tamsin said. “Why would Laney do this to you?”
“Because I’m a loose end. And I threatened to use my leverage against her.”
“But she gave you that leverage as insurance. As a token of trust.”
Ingrid sniffed. “And she broke it. Surprise, surprise, the diabolical mastermind is diabolical.”
“Paranoia,” Tamsin said dismissively. “Ren, the point of that leverage was so you’d trust Laney someday when you wouldn’t want to. This is that time.”
“How do you know?”
“Because your faith in her is being bloody tested. When else could it be?”
“No. Don’t you see, Tam? I’m the biggest threat to Laney now. I have real shit on her, and I planned to kill someone without her permission. She wants to silence me more than she wants vengeance on a shitbag like Crito.”
“That’s wild speculation—”
“Did she tell you to get me drunk that first night?”
Tamsin bit her lip.
“Did she, Tam?”
“Does it matter now? I’m on your side. You know that.”
“That’s a yes.” When Tam didn’t refute it, I went on, “Laney kept me in the dark about Jay being Crito. She’s smart—she doesn’t throw away an opportunity before she uses it. And she doesn’t reveal anything until she’s forced to. When Adam came back, she knew I’d want him dead. So she kept him and Jay on a leash, to sic them on me if I demanded vengeance, used my leverage. Which I did. Now here we are.”
“She’s not after you. You’re complicating things.”
Ingrid sighed out a blue cloud of cigarette smoke. She would not quit smoking indoors. I had half a mind to toss her cigs in the trash, for her own good.
“It’s not complicated,” I said. “It all adds up. Laney must’ve been planning to dispose of me for a while. You know her—she sets up the dominoes long in advance.”
“This is designed to look like something it’s not. Someone is playing you.”
Inge raised an eyebrow. “Have you checked your bloodwork recently?”
The interruption was so random I snapped, “How the hell could I afford to?”
Both girls stared at me.
“Sorry. Touchy. I’m not sleeping well.” I ran a hand through my hair. “Why do you ask, Ingrid?”
“Because paranoid thinking is a symptom of androgen overexposure.”
Testosterone has all sorts of bizarre, unexpected psychological effects, one of which influences trust. Higher T lowers your trust in others. In a clinical study, some women volunteered to increase their T tenfold, to average male level. Then they were shown photos of faces and asked to rate their trustworthiness. The more trusting a woman was before T, the more profound her loss of trust after. Her eyes changed, hardening. Losing empathy.
Trust interleaves with vigilance and suspicion. Vigilance taken too far becomes paranoia. All of these things correlate with testosterone levels.
We really do see the world differently depending on what hormones are circulating in our bodies.
“I’m not fucking paranoid,” I said. “And I don’t have the luxury of seeing a doctor right now.”
Ingrid looked at me a long moment, as if giving me a chance to confess. Then she sighed again and said, “I didn’t want to do this.”
She left the room. Tam and I frowned at each other.
Inge returned with a handful of something shiny, crumpled. Tossed it at my feet. Empty T packets.
“You’re overdosing,” she said.
“What the hell.” I dropped to a squat, frantically gathering them. “You dug these out of the trash.”
“So?”
“So that’s creepy as fuck. What is wrong with you?”
Her eyebrows rose, slightly.
You. You are what’s wrong with me, Sofie.
“I care what you’re doing to your body,” she said.